A beer, a quest, and some great company

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A beer, a quest, and some great company

Stratford Dungeon Master Ken Wood is trying to launch a Dungeons and Dragons group that can meet weekly or bi-weekly at Herald Haus Brewing to play a campaign he has developed for the popular role-playing game.

Stratford Dungeon Master Ken Wood is calling on fantasy enthusiasts to join him on March 13 at Herald Haus Brewing for the launch of a new Dungeons & Dragons group. Galen Simmons/The Beacon Herald/Postmedia Network

Calling all dwarves, wizards, orcs and elves. A world has been created, quests have been written, and beer has been brewed, but the dice of fate have yet to be cast.

Stratford Dungeon Master Ken Wood is seeking adventurers of all ages and skills levels as he sets out to establish a group of between 5 and 12 people who can meet regularly to play the popular role-playing game, Dungeons and Dragons.

“I’ve heard from so many people that it’s hard to make a friend in Stratford,” Wood said, dressed as a wizard and sitting at a table piled high with Dungeons and Dragons items he’s collected since he began playing the game in the mid-1970s. “Everybody’s polite, they’ll say, ‘Hello, good morning,’ it’s a pleasant city, it’s a beautiful environment, but to get people to sort of break out of their shells — whatever their routines are — and make new friends; a lot of people are finding it difficult. So I hope I’m going to aid in that.”

Having worked in IT in Toronto prior to retiring and moving to Stratford, Wood, who just turned 70, began developing characters, slaying dragons, and hunting for treasure with his co-workers as a way to relieve stress. As time went on however, he found the game to be a great way to meet new people and create lasting friendships.

Though Wood has joined at least one Dungeons and Dragons group since he moved to Stratford — through which he’s made several friends — he wants to establish his own group to help others find a similar sense of community.

“And it’s a lot of fun,” Wood said.

To make his vision a reality, Wood spent a considerable amount of time creating an entirely new fantasy world, which he has dubbed the Kingdom of Bright Shield. Complete with quests and side quests, non-player characters to interact with, monsters to defeat, and dungeons to explore, Wood said all he needs now is the characters and their players to craft the stories that will bring his fantasy kingdom to life.

On March 13 at 5:30 p.m., Wood is hosting a Dungeons and Dragons kickoff meeting at Herald Haus Brewing — a fitting setting considering most of the game’s adventures begin in a tavern. In that first meeting, Wood said he will give those who attend a run-through of how the game is played and how to develop characters, with the goal of finding a core group of players who can meet weekly or bi-weekly, for about three hours at a time.

Outside of that core group, Wood said players who can’t make that kind of commitment are more than welcome to drop in as guest characters throughout the Bright Shield campaign.

“Just with the advent of smart phones and everything else, everybody’s become very isolated — I mean we all know it. You see people talking to each other across the street via text, and kids get locked into it a lot, too. For this game, anyone 18 and older can probably come in and play. I want this to be more of a social thing… People get in there, they can imagine themselves as a new character or they can play themselves. They can play the opposite of themselves, they can experiment. And there’s kind of no consequences. You can get a character killed off, but then you can just build another character,” Wood said.

For more information about the Dungeons and Dragons group, check out Wood’s Facebook event page at www.facebook.com/events/2302949316639882/. For additional information on the wider Dungeons & Dragons community in Stratford, search Stratford and Area Dungeons and Dragons Community on Facebook.